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Giving thanks

I had prepared what I thought was a great teaching piece about the first Thanksgiving, talking to the kids about the pilgrims who had sought refuge in the new world so they would have religious freedom. Melissa, 4, amazed me with how much she knew about the pilgrim’s flight: “They came from England ... and they were running away from King George.” I leaned my microphone toward her and asked, “Do you know the name of the ship they came over here on?” “Yes,” she offered. “It was called the cauliflower.”

“You’d better not get caught with that. The rules clearly state you can’t take it with you.”

Kathy FloresLockport, Ill.

Wanted: Global positioning system

Many members of Messiah Lutheran Church, Springfield, Mo., are of Scandinavian heritage and have migrated from Northern states. In January our congregation emphasized mission work. To illustrate that such work is carried out worldwide, kids were asked during the children’s sermon if they had been to a foreign country. The first answer was: “Minnesota.”

Rick AllwardtSpringfield, Mo.

Last supper?

The youth at church had been studying the book of Esther. I knew my then-teenage son had been paying attention when we had brussels sprouts for supper. Spearing one and looking at it distastefully, he placed it in his mouth, saying, “If I perish, I perish.”

Frankie RolandCoffeyville, Kan.

Well, it is a meal

“On behalf of the congregation, I’d like to thank the anonymous donor of this candle ... everyone except the fire marshal is impressed.”

Emily Ann George, 4, who I baptized in May, asked her mom, “ Are we gonna eat dinner at the church tonight?” Her puzzled mom, Stacey, asked: “Why would you say that?” She answered, “Well, when the pastor walked us around the church, he told everybody that we were now part of the family of God, so I thought we’d be eating dinner there!”

John F. Hazel, Jr.Palmerton, Pa.

When the pastor announced the Lord’s Supper during worship our grandson, Zachary, 4, asked: “Are we having dinner here?

Harriet LearOshkosh, Wis.

Maintenance work

During worship at our after-school program I said to the kindergartners through third-graders, “I see some new faces here today that I don’t recognize.” One boy responded, “Pastor Terry, I don’t recognize you. You got a new haircut!” The children were amused by my short haircut so I asked them, “Do you know what this kind of haircut is called?” I told them the barber called it “low maintenance.” The teaching staff laughed, but the children didn’t find any humor in my response. One boy smiled and raised his hand to tell me his father calls him “high maintenance.”